The villagers started making their way toward the carts. Alekos returned to where Ren was standing next to the carriage. The man’s arms were crossed and he looked bored.
“That wasn’t bad,” he said. “Wasn’t as strong as when your father speaks.”
Alekos kicked at a stone. “I know. I’m working on it, I promise.” Ren grunted in response. Alekos figured the conversation was over so he turned back to the villagers.
The carts were filling by the minute. One man dropped five burlap sacks into the meat cart. Alekos could only imagine how much was in there. It could feed a least a dozen households for a week.
The Collection happened at the end of each season. Half of goods the villagers produced went to the city. There it was distributed to the citizens who needed it. The land in the city wasn’t as kind as the land up here.
Alekos shifted from one foot to the other; this was taking longer than he had expected. The crowd however, was no longer loud. It was dwindling, but only just.
After they placed their sacks in a cart, the villagers left. They trickled back to the main path that grew small until it disappeared behind a large, two story building. It didn’t look anything like the ones of the city. This building was made of wood and straw. It was misshapen, as if it were put together in a rush.
The paths looked to be made of stone, but it was only pebbles. Some of them were larger than others. Either way, it didn’t look very smooth. Alekos figured one had to walk very carefully.
He had only ever seen pictures of the village. There were old and recent books in the library of the castle. He had read most of them in the hopes of understanding more about his neighbors. Being here was much nicer. Just as he had imagined, the air was fresh and cool. A soft breeze made the trees whistle and shake. He closed his eyes to take it all in. This was a feeling he would never forget.
Freedom.
Ren cleared his throat. “They’re almost finished. We should head back to the carriage now.”
Alekos nodded. But when he turned to go, a girl caught his eye. Most of the crowd looked to be older, maybe twice his age. She was younger than he easily. She seemed out of place. If her age wasn’t enough, she was small. She was swarmed by the crowd around her and was blocked from his view every so often.
She dragged a burlap sack behind her. It was too heavy for her, too much for a girl to carry on her own. Each time the crowd in front of her stopped, she dropped the sack happily. No one moved to help her or even looked her way. She was on her own.
A sudden urge to help came over Alekos. He could carry the bag no problem. If no one else was going to help why couldn’t he? The glaring problem however, was that he had no idea how the Collection Day worked so he’d surely end up putting it in the wrong cart. That would probably only embarrass the girl.
He didn’t know what it was about her that had his standing there. He wasn’t particularly pretty. There was dirt on her face that nearly blended in with her tan skin. Her eyes were empty and dull, like she had nothing to look forward to anymore.
The only thing that stood out was her hair. It was the color of the setting sun, that deep red that spread across the horizon. Curls came together in a ponytail atop of her head. They went in several different directions. It was like she hadn’t taken any time to get ready in the morning.
He watched her continue to struggle, moving up in the crowd. The closer she got, the more apparent the sea of sweat on her forehead became. Her legs shook with every step and she looked less impressive by the minute.
Why was he so hung up on her? He couldn’t get himself to look away despite knowing he had to leave. She was inside his head, nagging, begging him to stay.
A strong hand landed on his shoulder. He turned to see Ren beside him once more.
“We’re leaving,” the bodyguard said definitively. “The king expects you back within the hour. There is still a distance for us to travel.”
Finally, Alekos was able to turn and head back to the carriage. The girl was still fresh in his mind, but he had relaxed and pushed thought of her aside. Even so, the more he thought about her the closer he got. How tempting it was to picture her face and fiery hair. There was something familiar about her and memories started to stir. If only he could reach out and grab them…
The carriage jerked as they started their journey back. Alekos hadn’t realized he’d even climbed inside. It was the girl; he was spending way too much energy thinking about her. He had to forget about her. He had to stop the obsession before it began. She would forever be a villager and him a royal.
“Something bothering you?” Ren asked. Alekos considered telling him the truth, but decided against it.
“I’m fine. Just tired I suppose.”
“I will alert the servants to prepare your bed upon our return.” Ren looked pointedly at the servant boy when he spoke. The boy looked up long enough to nod, then lowered his head. He was having a rough day.
The ride home wasn’t as bad as it was the way up. Maybe they were taking a different route. Maybe the driver remembered where the rocks were.
Maybe Alekos wasn’t actually paying attention.
He had too much to think about.
End of chapter
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137,435 Literary Works • 672,020 Reviews
Hi again, Noelle! ^^
This'll be my last chapter for the day, but I'll try to catch up with Hunted by the end of the week ~
I'm not sure how to feel about this part. I'm certainly interested in this world and what is going to happen, but I feel like the prologue is doing more to keep me hooked at this point. I feel like this was a very necessary chapter, since we do need these moments of introduction to understand the characters and relate to them to better our reading experience. However, I'm not entirely convinced this needs to be the first chapter.
Had I not read the prologue, I don't feel like I have a semblance of an idea of what the conflict of this story might be, and I feel that it's important to be giving clues and vague feelings to the reader for what is to come. The only thing I'm certain of is Alekos is somehow connected to this young girl and she is somehow important to the rest of the story. What is that story? I'm not really sure.
I wish there was a little more substance and weight to this scene. Because Alekos shows up, he witnesses these people giving their food away, sees the girl, and then leaves again. I want to understand what the purpose of this is and start seeing how the plot may unfold at the same time as meeting the characters and getting to know the world.
I have no problem with your writing. It was beautiful and very easy, relaxed to read, but I found myself not being that interested in what was occurring. It felt like too much thought and not enough action. (And I don't mean action as in tension in fighting, but just Alekos [i]doing[/s] stuff.)
Beginnings are definitely really hard, so far that I think this is still really good. Just trying to give my two cents to make it better ^^
Until the next time I picked this up again (hopefully not too long), best wishes with writing!
~ Wolfe
Hey @Noelle!
Another strong piece, which is great for you, and tough for me, because it's hard to find things to pick up on. I know you mentioned that this is a Robin Hood type story, and I really dug that vibe, the rich city dwellers coming to take half of everything from the village. That's a lot!
It threw up two questions to me, that don't necessarily need answering right now in this piece but maybe for you to consider:
1) are the people in the city also paying taxes? Monetary taxes? Or are they getting away with nothing? And is the city rich, or are there a lot of slums etc to feed? I guess we'll find out when Alekos gets back, but I'm interested!
2) a bit more random - the meat cart. Is the meat all smoked? I didn't understand how they were going to store and transport it. Also, meat back in the day was a serious rarity - I'm not saying that it's not worth mentioning the cart etc., just to consider that the five huge sacks would probably last more than a week, given that people might only actually eat meat once a week. Or maybe the point you're making is that the city is rather gluttonous. It's cool either way, but maybe just make your point a little bit more clearly!
I'm interested in the girl. I wonder what she had in the bag! And I can only assume that she's going to turn up again. I laughed at the description of her as if she'd had no time to get ready in the morning xD She's a peasant, Alekos! Get woke! She doesn't have any time for anything except the misery you foist upon her.
No but really, it's little tidbits like that that I loved about this chapter, feeding us just how clueless he is about his own people and their troubles, how much he lives in his own little world.
The only other thing I would mention is that, in places, your prose could be a little repetitive. Like, the word 'sack' was used quite a few times in this chapter, and while it's necessary, because there's a lot of sacks flying around, I definitely picked up on how many times it was being used, which sometimes suggests it's too much. Now, this is a first draft, so ignore me for now on this point, but when it comes to the second draft, I know you've got it in you to make that description out-of-this-world.
Onto the next part!
- Stella x
Hey Noelle, sorry that I'm so incredibly late!
and now you have the next part out anyway so xD
So, I'm still kind of lost on the setting of everything. Not so much as in where we are per se, although some description of the nearby might be nice (or maybe I forgot about it from chapter 1?) but either way, fleshing out the whole scene a little more wouldn't however. But what I mean is that I'm lost on the history of everything. Sure, you want some intrigue and to keep your readers interested and hungry for more, but I really feel like I'm not sure where everyone's allegiances are, or why they feel the way they do. That being said, I really do like most of your prose that you have. It's a very free-flowing almost stream of consciousness on what's going on, which works well since we seem to be pretty much in Alekos's head.
The girl is interesting. Good hook there. I'm guessing she's 8-10 years old? I am confused as to why no one is helping her? These villagers seem to be beaten down from years of the Collection, and not exactly happy people, but you would think they would band together for each other. And why would a kid be bringing the meat offering or whatever you want to call it?
I wish this chapter had a bit more to it, because I was just starting to get into it and it ended, but I guess since it's a half-chapter that makes sense
I would say for now, the big things are, letting us know why the characters act the way they do, who they are as people, and keep dropping hints about the past without info dumping.
~Messy
Hey there Noelle,
The 'I promise' part here makes him look a bit weaker to Ren. I'm not sure if it's intentional but I feel again like he and Ren are actually friends, rather than the prince disliking him.I saw you tagged me in the next part of this, but then realised I hadn't read the end of the first chapter so I'm going to do that and a quick review for you and then get onto the next section
I've actually highlighted this section because it's my favourite in this part so far. The beginning of this chapter/part of this chapter is a lot of statements, a lot of tell not show. This bit here is where you start to break that up and it works really well, I wonder if you could try to incorporate that style throughout as parts of it can feel a little stiff.
. I think you mean she
The whole seeing a strange girl in a crowd is a bit cliché but I'm hoping you can make it your own so we'll ignore that for now. This was quite a short section so I'm not really going to give any overall impressions but I shall go on and read the next part to see where you take it.
Icy